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Volume 90, Issue 6 Sioux Falls, S.D. Friday, Nov. 2, 2001
The Augustana
0,''.'00.<1>. 074;RP,MWM.W"MW'z
Mail room supervisor Mardelle Berg
Services. Hazard bags, a mask and
Photo by Naomi Zink
utilizes a biohazard kit as she sorts mail in Central
rubber gloves are used as precautionary measures.
FORUM: Matt and his bro
are like peas and carrots
VARIETY: A lesson in
Laramie for theater group
SPORTS: Volleyball
poised to make stretch run
Augustana taking anthrax precautions
BY ENRICO TOSI
MIRROR STAFF WRITER
The last three weeks have set the
stage for the explosion and growth
of the anthrax scare, the second
presumed terrorist attack to the
United States.
Major cities like Washington,
D.C., and New York responded to
bioterrorism thanks to their public
health departments' capacity to
treat thousands of people on short
notice. Responding to the problem
became more difficult when
anthrax reached New Jersey, a
state whose profile more resem-bles
the rest of the nation than New
York.
The disparity in the response
between major and minor cities is
something to consider in the possi-bility
of a wide-range attack.
Gov. Bill Janklow, for example,
is trying to have all the people in
South Dakota vaccinated against
the flu, the symptoms of which can
be confused with those of bioter-rorism
infections. It could be a
solution that might also help pre-vent
collective panic, now that
more people want to be tested.
Mardelle Berg, Augustana mail
room supervisor at Central Ser-vices,
said she feels fairly safe here
on campus.
"I have a feeling that if we
would ever have something like
that happen, it would probably be a
hoax, not the real thing," she said.
"Let's just hope that we're safe in
the little Midwest."
Hope is not enough to keep
postal workers safe; and Director
of Buildings and Grounds Gene
Marko has provided Central Ser-vices
with a biohazard kit.
"We have our rubber gloves, we
have our masks, we have haz-ardous
waste material bags," Berg
said.
Postal workers at Central Ser-vices
primarily deal with outgoing
mail, but they have procedures in
place in case of suspicious mail.
If it is Augustana-directed mail,
Berg said, the addressee can decide
whether to have the envelope
opened. For all the other cases of
suspicious mail, Central Services
will require the intervention of the
postal inspector, the Center for
Disease Control, Campus Safety
and eventually 911.
As government professor Den-nis
Stevens underscores, it is very
easy for hysteria to take place in
this kind of situation.
"It's true that in a theoretical
sense no one's really safe, but it's
also true that most of us are never
going to be in
this kind of
danger," he
said.
Journalism
professor Jef-frey
Miller is
afraid of
anthrax mostly
because he will
be in Washing-ton,
D.C., dur-ing
the first
week of
November.
"I'm not con-cerned
about
here," he said.
"In the larger
view, I'm much
more con-.
cerned about if
someone does
this with small-pox."
Government
professor
James Meader
is less optimistic. "Maybe it's
naive to think that we're far
enough away from Washington,
D.C., and New York that we don't
have to be as concerned, but
there's not a lot you can do either,"
he said. "You have to go on and
live your life the best you can.
Motivated or not, the fear of
finding a disease in the mail is
spreading faster than the disease
itself.
History professor Michael
Mullin confesses his subtle con-cern
of anthrax.
"It's just stupid, but you do think
about it," he said.
Mullin recalls the day after the
Daschle episode, • when he was
picking up his mail.
(See Augie page 8)
Augie self-study group
functions as a useful tool
Core curriculum under review
BY BERIT PRESTON
MIRROR STAFF WRITER
A self-study group was formed
within the college for the North
Central Association of Colleges'
(NCA) Oct. 14-16 visit at Augus-tana
to evaluate the school for con-tinued
accreditation.
However, pre-emptive to
accreditation by the NCA or not,
the self-study assembled by a team
of staff members, faculty and stu-dents
in preparation for the NCA's
visit has proven very insightful.
"It was a very positive accredita-tion
experience for Augustana,"
Dean of Students Jim Bies said.
"Through the self-study, we have
been able to recognize what we're
doing right, and what we need to
improve on."
The NCA, however, has yet to
release its results of the visit.
"The team visit [to Augustana]
is only one part of the complete
evaluation process, and any corn-ments
from us at this point would
probably be premature," said Lil
Nakutis, the Information Manage-ment
Coordinator of the Higher
Learning Commission of the
NCA.
Once the accreditation process
has been completed, the self-study
will continue to be a useful tool in
Augustana's mission to improve
the programs and the conditions of
the school as a whole.
"This self-study will be used as
a living document," Bies said.
"The point of going through this
process is not so much just for
becoming accredited, as it is a
means of figuring out what we
want to continue to work on, and
what we're doing okay with."
BY PETER SCHOLTZ
MIRROR STAFF WRITER
The Augustana Curriculum
Council convened Monday, Oct.
22 and commissioned a task
force to evaluate the college's
current general education pro-gram.
The task force, which has been
authorized but not yet created,
will determine the effectiveness
and utility of Augustana's core
curriculum component and report
its findings to the Curriculum
Council on reading day next
semester.
The task force will be a com-mittee
composed of two faculty
members from each of the three
academic divisions — humani-ties,
social science and natural
science — and two students to be
chosen by the Augustana Student
Senate. Director of General Edu-cation
John Bart will serve as
chair.
"The Curriculum Council,
while it makes additions,
changes and corrections to the
general [education] curriculum,
hasn't taken a serious look at
whether or not the goals and
objectives are still applicable
now from the time period in
which it was created, and
whether the classes that are being
offered in the various areas are
still meeting the goals of those
areas," Bart said.
Bart explained the need for a
special task force to study gener-al
education: "The Curriculum
Council could have just revised
[general education] on its own,
but with something as major as
general education, one of the
things you want to do is you want
to proceed in a cautious manner
and make sure that you're mak-ing
educated, well-founded
changes and directions," he said.
According to Curriculum
Council chair Mark Van Wienen,
two major questions the task
force is being asked to consider
are "Is the general education
achieving the aims for which it
was intended?" and "Do the
objectives of the general educa-tion
remain the objectives that
are desired?"
"It may be that the finding is
that the courses really are satisfy-ing
what they're meant to satisfy
in the area," Van Wienen said. "It
could be that they don't satisfy
what's in the area; but the new
thing that it's discovered they're
doing, is as good or better than
what the original intention was."
"It could be, though, that the
finding would be that the courses
are very diverse in a given area,
(See Curriculum page 8)

Volume 90, Issue 6 Sioux Falls, S.D. Friday, Nov. 2, 2001
The Augustana
0,''.'00.<1>. 074;RP,MWM.W"MW'z
Mail room supervisor Mardelle Berg
Services. Hazard bags, a mask and
Photo by Naomi Zink
utilizes a biohazard kit as she sorts mail in Central
rubber gloves are used as precautionary measures.
FORUM: Matt and his bro
are like peas and carrots
VARIETY: A lesson in
Laramie for theater group
SPORTS: Volleyball
poised to make stretch run
Augustana taking anthrax precautions
BY ENRICO TOSI
MIRROR STAFF WRITER
The last three weeks have set the
stage for the explosion and growth
of the anthrax scare, the second
presumed terrorist attack to the
United States.
Major cities like Washington,
D.C., and New York responded to
bioterrorism thanks to their public
health departments' capacity to
treat thousands of people on short
notice. Responding to the problem
became more difficult when
anthrax reached New Jersey, a
state whose profile more resem-bles
the rest of the nation than New
York.
The disparity in the response
between major and minor cities is
something to consider in the possi-bility
of a wide-range attack.
Gov. Bill Janklow, for example,
is trying to have all the people in
South Dakota vaccinated against
the flu, the symptoms of which can
be confused with those of bioter-rorism
infections. It could be a
solution that might also help pre-vent
collective panic, now that
more people want to be tested.
Mardelle Berg, Augustana mail
room supervisor at Central Ser-vices,
said she feels fairly safe here
on campus.
"I have a feeling that if we
would ever have something like
that happen, it would probably be a
hoax, not the real thing," she said.
"Let's just hope that we're safe in
the little Midwest."
Hope is not enough to keep
postal workers safe; and Director
of Buildings and Grounds Gene
Marko has provided Central Ser-vices
with a biohazard kit.
"We have our rubber gloves, we
have our masks, we have haz-ardous
waste material bags," Berg
said.
Postal workers at Central Ser-vices
primarily deal with outgoing
mail, but they have procedures in
place in case of suspicious mail.
If it is Augustana-directed mail,
Berg said, the addressee can decide
whether to have the envelope
opened. For all the other cases of
suspicious mail, Central Services
will require the intervention of the
postal inspector, the Center for
Disease Control, Campus Safety
and eventually 911.
As government professor Den-nis
Stevens underscores, it is very
easy for hysteria to take place in
this kind of situation.
"It's true that in a theoretical
sense no one's really safe, but it's
also true that most of us are never
going to be in
this kind of
danger," he
said.
Journalism
professor Jef-frey
Miller is
afraid of
anthrax mostly
because he will
be in Washing-ton,
D.C., dur-ing
the first
week of
November.
"I'm not con-cerned
about
here," he said.
"In the larger
view, I'm much
more con-.
cerned about if
someone does
this with small-pox."
Government
professor
James Meader
is less optimistic. "Maybe it's
naive to think that we're far
enough away from Washington,
D.C., and New York that we don't
have to be as concerned, but
there's not a lot you can do either,"
he said. "You have to go on and
live your life the best you can.
Motivated or not, the fear of
finding a disease in the mail is
spreading faster than the disease
itself.
History professor Michael
Mullin confesses his subtle con-cern
of anthrax.
"It's just stupid, but you do think
about it," he said.
Mullin recalls the day after the
Daschle episode, • when he was
picking up his mail.
(See Augie page 8)
Augie self-study group
functions as a useful tool
Core curriculum under review
BY BERIT PRESTON
MIRROR STAFF WRITER
A self-study group was formed
within the college for the North
Central Association of Colleges'
(NCA) Oct. 14-16 visit at Augus-tana
to evaluate the school for con-tinued
accreditation.
However, pre-emptive to
accreditation by the NCA or not,
the self-study assembled by a team
of staff members, faculty and stu-dents
in preparation for the NCA's
visit has proven very insightful.
"It was a very positive accredita-tion
experience for Augustana,"
Dean of Students Jim Bies said.
"Through the self-study, we have
been able to recognize what we're
doing right, and what we need to
improve on."
The NCA, however, has yet to
release its results of the visit.
"The team visit [to Augustana]
is only one part of the complete
evaluation process, and any corn-ments
from us at this point would
probably be premature," said Lil
Nakutis, the Information Manage-ment
Coordinator of the Higher
Learning Commission of the
NCA.
Once the accreditation process
has been completed, the self-study
will continue to be a useful tool in
Augustana's mission to improve
the programs and the conditions of
the school as a whole.
"This self-study will be used as
a living document," Bies said.
"The point of going through this
process is not so much just for
becoming accredited, as it is a
means of figuring out what we
want to continue to work on, and
what we're doing okay with."
BY PETER SCHOLTZ
MIRROR STAFF WRITER
The Augustana Curriculum
Council convened Monday, Oct.
22 and commissioned a task
force to evaluate the college's
current general education pro-gram.
The task force, which has been
authorized but not yet created,
will determine the effectiveness
and utility of Augustana's core
curriculum component and report
its findings to the Curriculum
Council on reading day next
semester.
The task force will be a com-mittee
composed of two faculty
members from each of the three
academic divisions — humani-ties,
social science and natural
science — and two students to be
chosen by the Augustana Student
Senate. Director of General Edu-cation
John Bart will serve as
chair.
"The Curriculum Council,
while it makes additions,
changes and corrections to the
general [education] curriculum,
hasn't taken a serious look at
whether or not the goals and
objectives are still applicable
now from the time period in
which it was created, and
whether the classes that are being
offered in the various areas are
still meeting the goals of those
areas," Bart said.
Bart explained the need for a
special task force to study gener-al
education: "The Curriculum
Council could have just revised
[general education] on its own,
but with something as major as
general education, one of the
things you want to do is you want
to proceed in a cautious manner
and make sure that you're mak-ing
educated, well-founded
changes and directions," he said.
According to Curriculum
Council chair Mark Van Wienen,
two major questions the task
force is being asked to consider
are "Is the general education
achieving the aims for which it
was intended?" and "Do the
objectives of the general educa-tion
remain the objectives that
are desired?"
"It may be that the finding is
that the courses really are satisfy-ing
what they're meant to satisfy
in the area," Van Wienen said. "It
could be that they don't satisfy
what's in the area; but the new
thing that it's discovered they're
doing, is as good or better than
what the original intention was."
"It could be, though, that the
finding would be that the courses
are very diverse in a given area,
(See Curriculum page 8)